


we can only do our best (to recreate)

by wolfsan11



Series: Sheith Week Unlimited 2017 [5]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Day 5: Friends, Everyone misses Shiro, Families of Choice, First Meetings, Gen, Harassment, M/M, Mild Angst, S2 Mild Spoilers, Set after Season 2, Sheith Week Unlimited 2017, Team Bonding, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-16
Updated: 2017-02-16
Packaged: 2018-09-24 21:38:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9788108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfsan11/pseuds/wolfsan11
Summary: With the loss of Shiro still fresh on their minds, the Paladins try and cope by revisiting happier memories. Keith ends up revealing more than he means to about how he and Shiro first met.Or, Keith struggles through the Garrison, meets Shiro and gives him a less-than-stellar not-quite-first impression.





	

**Author's Note:**

> *slaps a shitty title on and posts*  
> Sheith week, what, where?
> 
> AKA, this was supposed to be less than 5k  
> AKA, I STRUGGLED SO MUCH WITH THIS AND I'M STILL NOT ENTIRELY PLEASED  
> Please enjoy?

For the first few weeks after Shiro goes missing, they don’t talk about it; invariably tiptoe around mentioning his name in hopes of ignoring the worry-pain-fear that accompanies them everywhere.

So how it is that they end up here, on the couches, swapping stories about Shiro in the dead of the night, Pidge will never know.

“-and his face literally turned red! He blew up, started shouting about how Slav should count his hair follicles, and something about alternate realities?”

Lance gestures wildly as he speaks, with the constant enthusiasm that is his default setting (and faked to be louder, each day without Shiro). Hunk is patiently trying to listen to him, occasionally interrupting with scoffs and disbelieving grunts.

In the wide open space of the common room, the sounds bounce and echo far, as though to make up for what’s been taken from them.

Pidge pays no mind to the cacophony around her, tapping on her tablet to rewind the video she’d retrieved from the Beta Traz systems. Matt’s sooty face fills the screen again and she ignores the helpless twinge in her chest.

She doesn’t know where he is, who had taken him or where his rescuers’ allegiance lay, but she can only pray he is far away from the hub of the Galran Empire.

 _‘He’s alright,’_ she tells herself, _‘He has to be.’_

And if her thoughts extend to more than Matt or her father…Well.

She chances a brief glance at Keith, seated beside her on the couch. His arms are crossed over his chest, as always, and he seems vaguely mesmerised by the ‘Lance and Hunk Debate Show’.

_‘Good,’ she thinks, firmly._

He seems calmer than she’d expected, considering the topic. (Or maybe Pidge’s only deluding herself. The bright, desperate gleam in his eyes tells her enough.)

She tunes back in to the conversation in time to see Hunk dodge Lance’s flailing arms with practiced ease as the latter imitates Shiro in full-on rage mode (and she ignores the twinge again).

Lance has been at it for a while now, but Hunk is still not convinced.

“I dunno man, are you sure we’re talking about the same Shiro here?”

“ _What_? Are you serious, how many Shiros do you know, Hunk?”

“Just the one, but I guess even _I_ can be wrong sometimes.”

Lance’s jaw drops, eyes widening, and he inhales dramatically, a precursor (as Pidge has learned by now) to a long and heated argument.

Pidge sighs and swipes across the screen to quit the video. The tablet goes dark, and she lets it rest in her palms; resists the urge to turn it on again.

Then, there’s a nudge to her shoulder and she finds Keith watching her, eyebrow gently curled with the unspoken question.

It almost makes her fume.

 _‘This dumbass,’_ she thinks, rather fondly.

She shrugs off his concern with a tight smile, the weight in her heart retreating when he accepts the mild rebuff with a sad smile of his own. With Hunk and Lance being as nosy as they are, it’s comforting to have at least one person who knows when to not pick at her moods.

Together, they turn back to the bickering pair across from them, watch as Hunk huffs in frustration and rolls his eyes.

“I’m just saying,” he says defensively, “Based on what we’ve seen of the guy, Shiro would never get mad like that! Not in the way you’re describing, anyway.”

“Excuse you, _I’m_ the one who was on the mission, I know what I saw!”

“Well, maybe you saw wrong, then.”

“ _You-_!”

Pidge finally interrupts them before they can dissolve into an endless cycle of ‘Nuh uh!’s and ‘Yuh huh!’s.

“I hate to agree with Lance, _always_ , but…he’s right. I was there too, when it happened.”

Lance glares at her for the slight but nevertheless flings his arms out towards her pointedly as he smirks at Hunk.

“See, Hunk? What did I tell you? And to think you called me a _liar_ ,” he sniffs, clutching a hand to his chest.

“Uhhh, what? No I didn-”

“What are you guys even arguing about here?” Keith asks suddenly, the first word he’s said since he came down from the training deck (from his endless bouts with the Gladiator, really).

Lance clicks his tongue, eyeing Keith with mild irritation (and Pidge doesn’t know if she has become adept enough to read the underlying worry or if it is only familiar by how often she’s seen it now.)

“Keep up with me, mullet boy. Hunk is no longer my best friend because he called me a liar-”

“Again, _no,_ I didn’t-”

“-because he doesn’t believe that Shiro could ever get mad like-”

Keith waves a hand impatiently, and Lance stops, emitting a highly-offended squawk at the interruption.

“I got all of _that_ ,” Keith says, “but what I don’t get is why you’re all making this such a big deal.”

There’s a slight pause as his words register. Pidge slowly lowers the tablet to the couch and gives him a bland look. Because, what the heck, Keith?

“Maybe because it _is_ a big deal?” she drawls, raising both her brows for effect, “I mean, he yelled at a guy who’s been imprisoned and probably tortured in the hands of the Galra for who knows how long?”

She regrets it as soon as it’s out.

They all wince as one and Lance shakes his head, jumping in to defend Shiro (away from imagining Slav’s imprisonment, Shiro’s imprisonment, the Galra, Shiro missing, Shiro dea-).

“Pidge, come on. Of course he got mad what with Slav being so,” Lance waves his hand and racks his brain for a suitable word, “… _particular…_ about things. That guy was putting all of us, including himself, in danger. I mean, I’m not saying what Shiro did was okay, but it was the situation, right?”

Pidge concedes with a sigh, and they fall uneasily silent for a few seconds.

Shiro has always been an infallible figure, someone they all admire, one way or another. It’s hard to reconcile the image Lance is building with the one they have of him already, and to have it taken away is almost as painful as Shiro himself being gone.

“It’s still weird,” she mumbles.

Keith sits up suddenly and frowns at her.

“Look, Shiro’s great, but he can’t always be perfect. He gets angry sometimes, and I get what you mean, Pidge, I do. But it shouldn’t have to be like that. He shouldn’t have to be perfect, always,” he says quietly.

Everyone stares at him for a moment, caught in varying states of anxiety. No one quite wants to address how odd it is to talk about Shiro in the present tense, as though that particular void doesn’t exist.

But least of all, they’re reluctant to admit to the pedestal they’ve set for him, the mantle the Black Paladin had worked hard to hold on to; too hard even.

The thought hurts. It hurts terribly.

And perhaps that’s why they have to talk about it anyway.

“Yeah _, okay,_ ” Lance admits, _“_ But…still?”

Pidge studies Keith’s weary face, lined with exhaustion and the impact of Shiro’s loss, and a sudden thought occurs to her. If she’s guessing right, with the way he had worded it…

“Keith, are you saying that out of personal experience?”

Keith’s composure flickers for just a moment, with embarrassment and a tinge of guilt.

And Lance, in the fraught manner that most his actions take these days, seizes on with all the tact of those Yellmore things Coran keeps telling them about – that is, no tact at all.

“OOOOHHH! I sense an interesting story here! Alright, lay it on us, buddy. What did you do?” he demands, a strained grin painting over the cracks in his usual brazenness.

Keith throws him his perpetual frown, but he doesn’t deny the accusation. Hunk gapes at him, and even Pidge briefly wonders if she should go lay down for some much-needed rest. She’s _clearly_ hallucinating; Lance failing to provoke Keith into a fight?

But no, that’s exactly what’s happening.

“Alright, I’ll tell you,” Keith says, rolling his shoulders back to sit up straight.

Pidge blinks and settles back into the couch to listen, bemused. This would either be the most entertaining story she’d ever hear or the most heart-breaking. One could never really tell, with Keith.

“So. I, uh, might have kinda…” Keith pauses, seizes a moment to close his eyes and clear his throat nervously, takes a deep and even breathe. When he opens them again, he seems stable and less liable to shake apart at the seams.

“I might have pissed off Shiro when I first met him at the Garrison. Um, twice. Pissed him off twice. And before you ask Lance, _yes,_ both times were my fault.”

Pidge lets out a low whistle, and Lance asks, with ten times the emphasis and glee: “ _What did you do?_ ”

Keith sighs, rubbing at his face. No one misses the deep circles under his eyes or the tautness in his jaw that’s mirrored in each of them. It’s been a long two weeks.

“Before we met, I was having issues with one of the professors. He was being a jerk-“

“Oh my God, _you murdered him didn’t you_?”

Everyone turns and glares at Hunk for the ridiculous disruption, and he has enough grace to blush.

“Are you done?” Keith asks, sounding amused despite himself (and Pidge has to give props to Hunk for that one).

“Uh, yup. Sorry. Go ahead.”

“Thank you. So, like I was saying, this professor…”

* * *

Shit, shit, shit. He’s late.

Keith runs full-tilt down the hall, nearly dropping his bag as he jams his arms through the sleeves of his uniform.

So maybe the decision to attempt an all-nighter and work on a paper had been a little poorly planned. Combine that with a faulty alarm clock and now he’s late, on the one day he has an early class with cranky Professor Montgomery.

He’s lucky if the professor lets him in at all.

Dodging lingering students with a few near-collisions, he barrels around the corner as fast as he can. When Keith finally reaches the right hall, he flops against the wall by the door to catch his breath and make himself look presentable. As it turns out, it’s a near impossible task.

The crinkled uniform and messy, unbrushed hair would just have to do.

_‘I guess it’d be too much to ask for a miracle that he’s not in.’_

He slips the door open and immediately spots the professor near the front of the hall, turned away and facing the projector screen.

_‘Yes! I might just make it.’_

Inching quietly forward, Keith makes his way towards an open seat near the back of the hall and prays the professor doesn’t turn arou-

“ _KOGANE_!”

Keith flinches and curses under his breath. He’d been _so_ _close_.

“Get down here!”

Slowly, he straightens out of his crouch to find himself at the center of attention. The other cadets are all staring at him now, some with pity, most with a vicious kind of satisfaction at seeing him in trouble. And there at the front, Professor Montgomery, scowling at him with barely-contained venom.

 _‘What is his deal anyway?’_ Keith thinks sourly, resigned to the walk-of-shame down the steps to where the man awaits.

As he reaches the final step, he braces himself for the verbal-lashing he’s bound to get.

Montgomery does not disappoint.

“It’s nice of you to finally join us, Kogane. Did we interrupt your beauty sleep?” the professor asks disdainfully, lips curling up in a sneer. There’s a soft murmur of giggles that punctuate his question and Keith tries not to bristle. The professor’s gaze lingers on his unkempt hair and clothes; Keith forces himself to reel in the irritation and respond calmly.

“I’m sorry, sir. I had a late night-”

“I didn’t ask you for the sordid details of your sex life, cadet.”

The class bursts into scattered laughter, someone throwing in a few wolf whistles. Keith flushes and snaps his mouth shut as he stares down at the tiled floor, fist tightening around the strap of his bag.

_‘Don’t get mad. This isn’t the worst you’ve heard before. Don’t get mad. Don’t let it get to you.’_

No matter what people like to think of him, Keith is not stupid.

He’s not a model student, not like that Shirogane guy, or Sharma, or any number of his more studious classmates. But neither is he completely hopeless. He does his best and gets good reviews, keeps his head down and does his work, all in the hopes of keeping his hard-earned scholarship.

Somehow it’s never enough, Keith’s patience only lasting him so long, and after a few unfortunate incidences, his prickly attitude had earned him the label of ‘problem case’ amongst most of his instructors.

His peers prefer ‘lunatic’ and ‘freak’.

He’s aware. He’s well aware that his continued presence in the Garrison hinges on good behaviour and his exemplary flying. And although he had managed to impress some of the commanders with his flying instincts, Keith doubts it’ll do much to save his ass otherwise.

This is how it works: he has no power or money, and no one to vouch for him, nothing of value that would keep him from being booted out if they thought he was getting out of line.

He knows very well that he cannot afford to ruin this for himself.

So he lets the barbs slide, lets the snide remarks go and shields himself by not speaking out.

_‘Don’t get mad, don’t get mad, don’t mess this up...’_

But Montgomery is speaking again, and there’s always been something about his cold voice that grates at Keith enough to gradually erode at his precarious self-control.

“Do you really think yourself so above your fellow cadets that you can waltz into this classroom at your leave, Kogane?”

That startles him enough to respond.

“What? No, _sir_ , I-”

“Did I give you permission to speak, cadet?”

Keith bites the inside of his cheek, hard, tastes the sharp tang of blood.

“You may be a talented pilot, Kogane, but no one appreciates arrogance. I don’t think I need to remind you that there are plenty more deserving candidates who are clamouring at the chance to be in your position. We certainly would be better served by someone who displayed competence _beyond_ the seat of a fighter jet, someone with actual intelligence about him.”

His heart is hammering a sick beat into his chest, and he can feel the throbs of an encroaching headache. The other cadets are completely silent now, shocked into a cloying stillness as they watch the one-sided exchange with bated breath.

And Montgomery just keeps _talking._

“If you can’t appreciate the privileges you’ve been awarded, then perhaps I should fail you where you stand and bring that inflated head of yours down to Earth, hm? I wonder what your parents would sa-”

“Go fuck yourself.”

Someone gasps, a soft slip of sound, obscenely loud where the rest of the class is frozen.

Keith’s vision is strangely off; hyper focused yet distant, bleary like a fogged-up mirror. He blinks hard, watches as Montgomery’s face contorts into an ugly snarl, flushing ruddy red, then an ominous shade of purple.

“ _What_ did you-“

Ears thrumming with the rush of blood to his head, Keith’s voice is whiplash-tight as he speaks over the professor.

“You want it slower? I said go. Fuck. Yourself.”

And he ignores the professor’s enraged shout and the murmurs of his classmates, spins on his heels and walks right out.

* * *

Pidge can feel herself vibrating where she sits, fury writhing off her like she’s a robot on the fritz. The exhaustion and drowsiness has fled from her bones all at once, leaving her wired up and jittery.

“He didn’t get away with the shit he said, right?” she growls through clenched teeth.

Keith just shrugs, gaze on the floor, and she balks at the sight (where was the rage, where was the fire, where was Shi-).

“He was the instructor and I was the dumb, temperamental cadet. Plus, I’d just insulted him in a class full of witnesses who hate me. Who do you think they’d listen to?”

And he grins, a horribly wide slash of bared teeth.

“I thought they’d throw me out then and there, but I guess that came later, huh?”

_“Keith.”_

The word is choked out and stricken, and it’s only then that Pidge remembers the others.

Hunk and Lance are ashen, eyes blown wide; Pidge watches as they exchange anxious glances, heads dipping low with…shame?

A slow bloom of understanding seems to dawn over Keith, bleak and unhappy.

“Oh. I keep forgetting we were in the same class. In Montgomery’s course.”

Lance wrings his hands in distress, his grimace an answer in itself. Hunk reaches out to him, but before he can do more than settle a firm pat on his shoulder, Lance lets out an explosive sigh and looks at Keith.

“Keith, I’m sorry,” he blurts.

Everyone is quiet as Lance fidgets in his seat. He’s clearly discomfited, struggling to look Keith in the eyes, but still he looks on, with intent and determination.

“I’m sorry for what happened to you, and for being an ass to you back in the Garrison.”

Keith’s mouth drops open in shock.

“I…I was there, I remember laughing with the rest of the class when Montgomery was chewing you out, even when a part of me knew it was wrong. Knew it was horrible. Y-you didn’t deserve that…at all. So, I’m…I’m really sorry. For the way I acted before, and…I guess for how I treat you sometimes, even now.”

Pidge finds herself genuinely surprised, adjusting her glasses with a clumsy hand. Lance was a good guy, really, but she’d never thought he’d actually apologise to Keith.

Then Hunk ducks his head and coughs, a low hoarse rasp, which prompts them to look at him.

“I…I’m sorry too, Keith. I don’t think I’ve ever hurt you directly, but just in case I did, I swear I never meant to,” Hunk says awkwardly, “I could…probably have been a whole lot better to you than I was. So, I’m sorry. A-and I promise! I’m gonna try to be a better friend from now on.”

“Same here,” Lance concurs, meeting Keith’s gaze head on.

Pidge holds her breathe, sudden realization filling her.

Whatever has triggered this sudden remorse, it isn’t just about righting past wrongs (Although she knows a large part of it certainly is). This had started out linked to the Montgomery fiasco, but that’s not what it’s about anymore.

Part of it is about Lance’s unprovoked dislike, and at times outright malice towards Keith; it’s Hunk passively siding with his best friend despite not approving of the one-upmanship. And from there, it’s about Kerberos; it’s about the way the Garrison had let down Keith, like she knew many had done before.

But in the end, as inevitable as it is when it comes to Keith: it’s about Shiro.

Hunk’s words are the key; this is an offer of unconditional support, for what they will do to get back Shiro, but also for Keith. Just for Keith.

They know what he can do with the Black Lion. And they’re here to see it through.

The idea grips her hard by the throat, because suddenly she’s not sure if Keith himself knows this. If he knows what exactly Lance and Hunk mean, and just how much it resonates with her too.

If he doesn’t know then-

“I’m with you too,” she says quietly, a strong whisper which carries enough for them all to hear.

Keith cocks his head but doesn’t say anything, his brows furrowed as he contemplates them with an intense calm she can’t decipher.

Then, finally, he shakes his head and his face falls lax. An uncertain quirk shapes his lips and he gazes at each of them, blue-grey eyes so large and accepting (when has Keith ever looked this young, this innocent?)

“Thank you,” he says, hesitant yet firm, “But it’s not necessary. I already trust you all, I… I see you. You didn’t really have to say all that, you don’t have to apologise at all, but I appreciate it all the same.”

(Cue the third twinge in her chest; she should really get that checked out.)

Lance makes a weak sound like he’s been stabbed. He nods, a short and abrupt motion, and promptly buries his face into Hunk’s side. Keith rises half-way from his seat, alarmed by the reaction, but Hunk just pulls Lance in securely and sends them a shaky but reassuring smile which settles Keith just a little.

Pidge sighs.

That had been a long time coming.

They’re no way close to being okay, but maybe…just maybe.

When Lance resurfaces, he’s almost immediately back to normal, pretending his eyes aren’t red or that the grin on his face isn’t dangerously close to slipping off.

Pidge takes it as a sign to go ahead anyway. It’s the only way forward for any of them.

“So, what happened after that, Keith? Did the professor screw you over? And where did…where does Shiro come in all this?” Pidge asks.

Keith clears his throat roughly, head dipping low until his face is half-shadowed by inky hair.

“Well, I wasn’t in trouble, exactly. Montgomery backed off a little after that, couldn’t risk me blabbing about his…prejudice, and like I said, there was an entire class of witnesses. Anyone would have been happy to throw me under the bus, but I guess the professor didn’t know that.”

Pidge’s gaze flits over to Hunk and Lance, sees them staring resolutely at the floor as they listen. She garners that they’re okay, for the most part, if in a more sombre mood than usual.

“I tried to avoid stirring up more trouble, but he still made my life miserable, all the same,” Keith continues, “He’d find excuses to cut marks so my grades went to shit, called me out in class to humiliate and make an example of me.”

Yeesh. Pidge can only imagine a slightly younger Keith, trying to evade the wrath of a professor gone far beyond reason. Keith, angry and incessantly maligned, unwilling to put his faith in authority figures, would not have been able to control his reactions for all that long.

“Eventually, the instructors noticed my slipping grades and decided I needed help. So, they decided to assign me with a mentor.”

_‘Oh.’_

Pidge smiles and leans back till her spine meets cushioned couch, feeling a sudden sense of ease. She could already guess where this was going.

“It was Shiro, wasn’t it?”

A small grin graces Keith’s face as he nods.

“Yup.”

Relief fills her, just for a moment, at the idea that Shiro had been there for Keith at a rather rough point in his life. Her mind had been concocting image after image of worst-case scenarios, but maybe it hadn’t been as bad as she’d imagined.

(And she resolutely does not think of Kerberos, or of families of blood and choice, adrift again in uncertainty-)

Hunk finally breaks the silence with a slight chuckle, his skin returned to a healthy toned brown from the wan gray it had been.

“Shiro must have set things straight right then, huh?” he asks.

To their surprise, Keith snorts, amusement apparent in his smirk.

“Uuum, that’s not quite how it went, no.”

* * *

“Kogane. Hey. Kogane!”

Keith stops walking with a groan, and waits impatiently for Shirogane to catch up.

_‘Stupid Garrison. Stupid Montgomery. Stupid mentoring programme for goddamned ‘misguided’ students.’_

The taller boy walks up to him with the perpetual warm smile aimed his way, and Keith nearly recoils. As it is, he can barely keep himself from spitting at him like an angry snake.

Something about Shirogane’s stupid face just sets him off; no one could possibly be so continually up-beat and nice unless they were faking it, right?

“What do you want?” Keith asks, blunt and rude and uncaring either way.

_‘Just because Shirogane’s the star pilot, the Golden Boy of the Garrison, my mentor, and the one hope for me not flunking out of Montgomery’s class…No. No way. I’ll fix this on my own.’_

But Shirogane shows no signs of being put off by Keith’s caustic attitude and only raises an eyebrow at him.

“You didn’t show up for our mentoring session.” he says, folding his arms over his chest.

_‘Right.’_

“I forgot. Sorry,” Keith says, and makes to move away, but Shirogane grabs his shoulder suddenly, locking him in place, and Keith goes rigid. Anger flares in him at the unwanted contact and he’s about ready to deck the boy, senior cadet or not.

Before he can move, Shirogane gives him an apologetic smile and releases him, apparently content with having gained Keith’s attention. Keith scowls and thinks of bolting again, before he finds himself levelled with a surprisingly unyielding gaze.

_‘Huh. Who knew Shirogane had it in him.’_

“This is the third time this has happened, Kogane,” says Shirogane, deep and serious, “We haven’t even had a session since the introductory one, but you always have an excuse for skipping out. Somehow, I have a hard time believing that you just forgot.”

Keith retreats a step away from him, irritation pulsing in his veins.

“I just got busy, alright?” he lies, because Shirogane doesn’t have to know, “I have a lot of assignments-”

“Well, that’s the whole point of the mentoring programme. So I can help you in whatever you’re struggling wit-”

“I’m not struggling with anything!”

“That’s not what Montgomery says-”

“Oh, screw this.” Keith grunts in irritation and turns away. To Shirogane’s credit, or his discredit depending on who you asked, he doesn’t let Keith get too far and catches up again, quickly.

“I don’t understand why you’re being so stubborn about this,” he says, his long legs easily eclipsing Keith’s shorter gait (and Keith feels resentment and irritation pile up higher). “I’m just trying to help-”

“I don’t _need_ your help,” Keith hisses, speeding up, but it’s useless. Shirogane is stubborn. Worse than that, he’s _motivated._

“Listen, Kogane. I don’t know what the problem is here but this is no way for a cadet to behave.”

Keith freezes abruptly and Shirogane neatly sidesteps him instead of crashing into his back. And somehow, that’s what gets his blood boiling.

He whirls around to face Shirogane, the space between them dissolved to a mere inch.

“I couldn’t care _less_ what Montgomery told you, or what you think about my _behaviour_. Leave me the fuck alone, Shirogane,” he snarls.

Keith doesn’t even deign to wait for a reply, choosing to stomp away towards the dorms.

_‘Stupid friendly goody-two-shoes pilo-‘_

“HEY!”

He startles as a hand grabs his elbow and Shirogane is in his face again, but suddenly there is no trace of the overbearingly kind, warm, _perfect_ , star pilot who’d been hounding him for the past week.

Instead, all he can focus on is how exhausted he looks. All he can see is dark circles, an unshaven jaw (‘ _Um_ w _hoa.’_ ) and red-tinged grey eyes set in a surprisingly young and tired face.

Shirogane grits his teeth at him as he stabs a finger into Keith’s chest.

“Listen here, you! I don’t know _what_ your deal is and why you’re being such a _pain in the ass_ but I’ve just about _had_ it with your attitude. Don’t you care about the commanders getting on your case at all? Or mine?! Look, I have enough work to do as it is and if you keep this up, s _o help me_ if you don’t get your act straight, I’ll...I’ll have your damned flight privileges revoked until you shape up!”

Keith mind goes blank as he gapes at the boy, struck speechless at the complete turnaround in temperament.

_‘What the heck.’_

Shirogane is breathing hard from the spout of words, and as the seconds pass, he seems to become aware of himself, his cheeks slowly staining a dark red. Keith stares, fascinated, as the angry frown falls and Shirogane’s lashes flutter rapidly, embarrassment taking over his features.

“I…shit. Shit, I’m sorry!” Shirogane moves back hastily, putting distance between them.

Keith continues staring, only half-aware of how ridiculous he must look.

“You- well. Look, I’m… I’m sorry for yelling at you but…,” Shirogane stammers, “If you would just let me do my job as your me-“

“Okay,” Keith blurts and then internally kicks himself for the slip-up.

Shirogane stops and blinks at him in frank surprise.

“…okay? Really?”

_‘Yeah brain, really? Shit.’_

The older boy is watching him carefully, awaiting his response and Keith opens his mouth again, before he can will himself to stop.

“I didn’t know you’d get in trouble-”

He cuts himself off too late, his teeth clicking audibly as his voice trails off, awkward and stilted.

Shirogane looks away and coughs, rubbing the back of his neck with a large hand; his flush seems to grow worse as the silence lengthens.

Then he smiles again, a silly, sunny thing and…it’s incomparable to the ones Keith’s seen before. It’s bright and real, and _more_.

“Great! I mean, I’d _rather_ you agreed to this out of a need to improve rather than over pity for me, because what kind of example would I be setting as a senior, right?” Shirogane jokes, chuckling, “But I’ll take anything at this point. Alright then, so we’ll meet tomorrow as scheduled?” he confirms, practically glowing with a blinding happiness.

And Keith nods dumbly and gawks after Shirogane as the boy walks away with a cheerful wave.

_‘Shit. What the hell just happened?’_

* * *

Lance is laughing, obnoxious and loud as always, tears of mirth dotting his lashes.

“I-I can’t be-believe you actually got Shiro mad at you!” he croaks out.

“And that he totally guilt-tripped you into letting him mentor you,” adds Pidge, with a snicker.

Keith throws them a dark, mutinous look which only sends them into another fit of laughter.

“So why _did_ you give in then, if you didn’t want his help?” Hunk asks, watching him appraisingly.

Pidge definitely doesn’t imagine the pink dusting Keith’s face and neck, but it’s so light that the others don’t notice and she wisely keeps it to herself. Keith takes a deep breath, gathering himself like he needs a moment to think about it.

“…Maybe _because_ he got angry?”

 _‘What,’_ Pidge thinks flatly and Keith must see it too, his flush becoming pronounced as he turns his face away from her.

“I’m just saying,” he starts again, warily, “After months of hearing about the ‘unflappable, genius pilot Shirogane’, I already had this image of how he’d be. Then we met, and I was right. He was just like every other person I’d ever known. He was there to do his job, he didn’t care about me, nor did I about him.”

Keith’s eyebrows meet as he tries to figure out how to explain further.

Lance and Hunk seem to be hanging on to his every word, mouths falling agape as they lean forward in their seats. Pidge can’t help the amusement; she can guess, again, where this is going.

“That’s what I thought at first, anyway, until he yelled at me. I’ll admit I felt kind of bad that he was getting in trouble because of me, but let’s face it. There’s no way they would have punished him just for failing to ‘get me in line’, and he knew it.”

“He was just trying to get me to react, and that was...something. He thought I was _annoying_ and _rude_ , he could have washed his hands off me, easy. But he didn’t. Right then, he was another kid like me but he was also...Shiro. And he cared.”

Pidge clenches her fists, nausea threatening to swallow her whole. Across from her, Lance and Hunk are still, unmoving, even as Keith shifts in discomfort.

She doesn’t know what to do with the revelations Keith has given them.

Whatever relationship he had with Shiro, it was abundantly obvious to anyone that they were close, and here, with his emotions bubbling up so close to the surface, she knows he misses Shiro more than anyone could comprehend. How did Keith deal with this at all? How did he manage to wake up every-

Lance takes a deep breath and coughs a loud “ _GAY_ ” into a curled fist.

Hunk giggles nervously and Pidge can’t hold it in either. She snorts, laughter spilling out, and she’s relieved to hear Keith join in with a raspy chuckle as he rolls his eyes at Lance.

Lance seems rather pleased that he’s managed to get them all to laugh again, despite the less than cheery atmosphere.

And it breaks the spell of melancholy that had settled over her, lets her breath in the cool air anew, safe from the suffocating weight of her own thoughts.

But then-

Keith slowly lets the smile die, shuttering himself away just as suddenly as the laughter had come and gone.

“He…he helped me out, so much,” he murmurs, a sad smile on his face, meant for only one person. “When he figured out that I didn’t need his help for the class…well.”

* * *

Somehow, Keith ends up learning more about his mentor than he does about his courses, with every session they have. Shirogane has a way about him that pulls people in, a magnetic and charming personality that gets him onto everyone’s good side.

Keith, to his dismay, finds himself just as vulnerable to it, and with every interaction he gets further drawn in, eager to absorb everything he can about the boy.

In his defence: Shirogane is smart, talented, and funny, and _very_ easy on the eyes. He’s dedicated to his work, but always finds time to look out for others, to ask after their health.

He’s also just as likely to prank them; a mischievous side to him that Keith only discovers when he’s the unfortunate victim to one of them. (Shirogane apologises to him over and over for that one, for nearly a week afterwards.)

He makes poor decisions when it comes to his own sanity, and procrastinates from working as much as possible, only to regret it as he drowns under a heavy load of assignments.

He’s a giant walking contradiction that Keith can’t figure out.

And he prefers a nickname over his surname.

(“Call me Shiro”. “…Keith.”)

Keith is not afraid to admit, to himself at least, that he may be more than just a little into Shiro. He’s not expecting anything from it, but there’s no harm in letting himself enjoy Shiro’s company, right?

So of course, that’s when everything comes to a head. As they sit in the library for their seventh session together, his mentor finally brings up the unavoidable.

Keith drums his fingers against the table, waiting impatiently as Shiro checks over his work, once, twice, three times; he’s not sure if he should feel nervous or not, but this is the longest he’s taken in reviewing his assignments.

After much fiddling and shuffling, Shiro sets the papers down on the table, fixing Keith with a strange look.

“This paper is…really well done, Keith. Good enough to bring you out of the danger point, anyway,” he says, mouth set in a light frown.

Keith tries not to show just how much the acknowledgement warms him, but he must not succeed very well. Shiro’s face turns grave.

“Alright,” Shiro says, and he feels oddly pinned by that sharp gaze, “Tell me the truth. Did you write this yourself, or…?”

A rock settles in his throat and he can't breath.

If there’s one thing Keith cannot stand, it’s having his honesty called into question. His skin prickles with the implication, agitation rising as he imagines the Garrison trapping him in yet another lie.

“Of course I wrote it myself!” he snaps, temper flaring before he can hold it.

“I’ve seen your past papers, Keith. They’ve always been decent, but if they were really your work, then you wouldn’t be struggling so much with your classes at all. So I’ll ask again, what is the truth here?”

Keith opens his mouth, then stops, part uncertainty and part sheer fear not allowing him to speak. What if…

It hits him, stark and obvious.

Whatever he said now, Shiro wasn’t going to believe him anyway. Why would he?

“You can either tell me, or I can go find out myself from Montgomery-”

Keith sighs, rubbing at a slight ache in his temples. The brief joy he’d felt at the praise is gone, snatched away as soon as it had appeared.

“I already told you I didn’t need the mentoring, didn’t I?” he mumbles.

Shiro stares at him, grey eyes scanning over him like a laser.

“Keith…I just want to help. So please, tell me what’s going on.”

He wavers for another moment, pulled in by how sincere Shiro sounds.

_‘Ah, what the heck. You have exactly nothing to lose, Kogane.’_

So Keith tells him.

He tells him about Montgomery, unreasonable and setting him up for failure with all the hate he has yet to understand. He tells him about the sneers that follow him from hall to hall, perpetual, dividing and damning.

He admits to losing grip on his anger and lashing out at the wrong moment, admits to losing favour with the commanders almost as soon as he’d gained it, for not being good enough, for _daring_ to be other enough.

He lays himself out until he’s bare, until his throat clicks with sandpapery thirst.

As soon as he’s done, Shiro springs up from his chair, letting it topple behind him with a loud clatter. Several people hiss their displeasure, but Shiro pays them no heed and suddenly he’s dragging Keith up from his chair and pulling him along towards the exit. Keith yelps in surprise and follows helplessly in Shiro’s storming wake.

“What are you doing?” he demands, trying to snatch his wrist back, but Shiro has him in a vice grip and won’t let him get away. By the time Keith recognises the hallways, the path to the Instructors’ Cabin, it’s too late.

Keith’s heart plunges into his stomach and his anger tapers away, leaving him with the draining weight of resignation.

He should have known.

Shiro slows down and finally releases Keith’s wrist.

“Stay right here,” he says, and Keith can’t read his voice at all, can’t predict how much trouble he should be expecting once Shiro goes in and rats him out to the instructors.

So he yields and leans back against the wall, looks away as Shiro walks in to the cabin. He tries not to imagine returning to the empty house that awaits him in the desert, tries to push away the bile and disappointment that chokes him when he thinks again about how much he had wanted this, how much he had wanted to stay.

 _‘Fucking dumbass,’_ he berates himself, winds his fingers into his hair and pulls _,_ hard and unforgiving, _‘You couldn’t have just reigned in your temper and let them talk all the shit they wanted? You couldn’t have walked away from him, couldn’t have known better after everything that’s happened?’_

It seems like hours pass before several raised voices reach his ears; it halts his rapidly spiralling thoughts and he strains to hear them. It sounds like some kind of argument.

_‘…What’s going on?’_

Abruptly, the door slides open and Shiro gestures him in with a curt nod, face cautiously blank. Keith gathers himself shakily and can only brace for what he’ll find as he walks in.

From there on, it’s like someone presses the fast forward button.

He’s confronted by a group of officers and instructors, some familiar, some not, as they grill him with question after question. There are mentions of a hearing and someone pulls up his records, his online assignments and test scores, but it’s a blur to him and he can barely make himself function enough to answer everything they ask.

Throughout it all, Shiro stands right behind him, and despite himself, there’s a sense of steadying comfort knowing the boy is there, feeling his presence at his shoulder. It’s unfamiliar, dizzying, and ever so soothing.

Much later (months and months afterwards, with tears pulling his throat tight from the pain of loss), the realization would hit him. Somewhere and somehow, Shiro’s anger had been the catalyst that brought them along to this point, to the start of a hesitant but slowly strengthening bond.

Not far from now though, he would ask “Why would you do that for me?” and hold his breath for the inevitable response about duty.

Instead, Shiro would give him that stupid smile and say: “I would have helped you regardless, Keith, but…we’re friends now, right?”

And Keith would splutter and flush and deny it, and be inescapably caught in the security that was Shiro’s laughter.

Until then? He simply reels with the knowledge that someone believes in him.

* * *

It feels like years have passed since Pidge has grinned like this, without guilt rising immediately to dash it away.

Lance discreetly scrubs at his cheeks with the sleeve of his jacket, but Hunk doesn’t even bother hiding his sniffles.

 _‘Saps’_ , she thinks happily, suspended in a light and pleasant brightness, just for that moment.

Then, Keith whispers an apology and folds into himself, face in his palms. She catches sight of the trail of tears slipping past a mouth drawn back in gnarled grief.

She can practically see the cogs turning in his head, greased with the oil of a sickly, strangling sorrow.

“I want him back,” she hears him whisper, and it sets her alight all over again.

Without thinking, Pidge elbows him sharply in the ribs and watches him straighten up with a jerk, wet eyes wide and wounded as he looks at her. She glares at him with all the righteous fury she can muster.

“We’re _getting_ him back. You hear me? _We_ are _getting_ him back. We’re getting Shiro back, and we’re finding Matt and my dad too, and then we’ll all be together again and heading back to Earth to the rest of our families and if you even _think_ about doubting tha-”

Pidge startles as Keith throws an arm around her and pulls her tight into his chest. She feels his head burrow into her hair, like he’s hiding himself away in her short brown locks. His arm settles over her shoulders, shaking with minute tremors.

_‘He’s trembling.’_

With a sigh, she presses closer into his shirt, unable to see in the dark cover it affords her and not caring either way.

Two more hands (bony and strong, large and all-encompassing) fall onto her back, and Keith’s too probably, from the way he goes stiff, before melting easily into their touch. The smell of sea salt and sweet caramel fills her nose, Lance and Hunk, gathering them together, whole.

“We’re getting them back. We’ll be okay,” she whispers, firm and fierce and believing.

Keith gives her a hoarse affirmation, breath hitching with a watery laugh and she welds her arms around every part of him, just as she feels those other arms weld around them both, holding them up.

She knows they will be fine, and if Keith needs a reminder every now and then, then she’ll be that for him. Her conviction does not allow for anything less.

Four out five is pretty good odds as far as she’s concerned, and she doesn’t know who else she’d trust more to find a single missing Paladin than the loyal ones that complete the set.

They are the Paladins of Voltron. They’ll be more than okay.

**Author's Note:**

> This went everywhere and nowhere, ahahaha. I may come back to edit just because I hate the beginning so much.
> 
> Twitter @wolfsan11


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